If you’ve used Facebook over the past few years to drive traffic to your website – and to generate sales – over the past 12 months you will have probably seen an increase in your efforts. Facebook constantly rolls out new initiatives to make referral traffic easier for users, and have recently introduced another new feature for us: Facebook tagged products.

At the bottom of the status update bar on your business page there will be a new button to tag products within your posts.

Use your Facebook status bar to tag your products.

When you tag a product within a post, it will provide a link directly to that product’s page on your website. Instead of simply appearing as a link, however, it tells your audience that this is the ‘product shown’ within the content. What’s even more exciting is that you can tag up to 30 different products in the one post. Facebook’s intention behind this new feature is to assist businesses with the organic discovery of their products.

A recent tagged product post from Baby Bunting

Facebook has confirmed that they’re currently testing the feature, so it’s only available organically at the moment. But we dare say it won’t be long until they monetise this posting option within the ads manager – so make the most of it while you can.

We’ll be using this feature over the coming weeks to test how tagging products compares to the call to action button and the carousel product posts in driving organic traffic to our clients’ websites.

We anticipate that this new way of driving traffic to your website will exceed the average click-through rates of other types of posts because it’s an immediate call to action. Shoppers can see the price right there on Facebook and the tag even provides information on whether the product is currently on sale. It’s literally an extension of your website.

Note: to access tagged products you must have a catalogue or shop section set up on Facebook. Once you have done this, the option will appear in your status bar.

Snapchat is one of the youngest platforms in social media but has certainly made an impact on the digital world very quickly. First launched in July 2011 by Evan Spiegel, Bobby Murphy and Reggie Brown under the name of ‘Picaboo’, the inspiration of the platform was finding an answer to sending images to people that you may have later regretted. In September 2011 the platform was rebranded to ‘Snapchat’ and the growth started to snowball.

In October 2013, Mark Zuckerberg offered $3 billion to buy the platform, which was swiftly rejected. In 2014 Snapchat posted revenue of $3 million, in 2015 it rose to $50 million and this year they’re projecting $350 million in revenue. In March 2016 the platform was valued at $16 billion. Wise move rejecting Zuckerberg.

Who snaps?

With over 100 million active users in 2015, users are collectively sending over 9000 snaps a second. In December 2015, 36% of Americans aged 18-29 had an account, and they are reporting over 7 billion video views each day.

Why Snapchat will soon change the way marketers market

It’s authentic

Unlike Facebook and Instagram, Snapchat doesn’t allow you to force your audience to view pushy marketing messages on its platform. So if your brand has no interest in sharing engaging stories with your audience and your only objective is to push product down your customer’s throats, then Snapchat is not for you.

The language Snapchat uses demands authenticity. Instead of a ‘timeline’ or ‘newsfeed’ on Snapchat, you view a person’s or business’s ‘stories’. This playfulness and impermanence forces users to be their true selves and businesses need to follow suit.

Snapchat is easy to use, but it’s hard to be good at. Businesses who master and engage this platform early will be the winners.

It’s real-time two-way communication

All social media allows us to speak directly to our audience, but it doesn’t necessarily allow for two-way communication.

Many corporate Twitter and Facebook accounts will badge themselves as the platform where you can have a real time conversation with a representative from the organisation, but is it an honest and authentic conversation? On many of these accounts you’ll view stock standard responses coming from businesses, but what if customers could snap you a video of their enquiry and they could receive an immediate and custom response via chat or video? Customer service brilliance.

It’s marketing disguised as messaging

Through Snapchat brands are provided a direct line to their customers and, with the recent automation of the ‘Snapchat story’, this almost guarantees your followers will view your content.

Unlike Facebook, Twitter and Instagram there’s no clever algorithm determining what users see; it’s simply delivered to them almost in message form. This again highlights the need for businesses to be authentic and creative with their content because pushy marketing will quickly be viewed as spam and will result in your customers unfollowing you.

So what is planned for the future?

Sharing functionality

Users currently cannot share content they view on Snapchat, but have hinted that this development is on its way. If you were able to ‘re-snap’ images or videos that were sent directly to you, it would almost defeat the original intent of the platform; so we’re predicting that this will be a function of the ‘story’ in the not so distant future.

Analytics

Snapchat won’t give you too much insight into who’s viewing your snaps and their finer demographics, but this will be here soon. With the rise of businesses and influencers paying attention to the platform, this is a natural and important next step.

Snapcodes

A snapcode is Snapchat’s version of a QR code. While the QR may have recently fizzled away, we might see the renaissance of this function via Snapchat to benefit brands by allowing followers to access exclusive offers and events.

While Snapchat has a long way to come if it’s to become the number one social network, the growth and demographics of this platform cannot be ignored. Consider how you can incorporate Snapchat into your social media strategy and the value this could add to your customers’ interaction with your brand.

InSocial Motive‘s series on the five core social motives, we explore just what it is that drives us to feel, think and act.

According to social psychologist Dr Susan Fiske, the basis behind our decisions in social situations can be distilled into five core motives: trust, understanding, growing, influencing, and belonging.

Understanding these five core social motives is essential to any situation where we interact with other people; in essence, the five core social motives make up the very fabric of our lives.

To grow

It is a daily tension that physical growth and maturation don’t exactly correlate with mental and emotional growth. Rather than being disheartened by this, people all over the world try every day to achieve little victories in their lives and grow as people.

This social motive ‘to grow,’ this striving to reach our potential – which Abraham Maslow described as the pinnacle of the human experience – is a motive to which those lucky enough to live in the developed world can devote considerable time and effort.

Why is it important to grow?

As humans, one of our points of cultural pride is our accumulation of wisdom, information and technology, the inter-generational communication of which holds primacy in much of our shared narrative. It is therefore no wonder that much of our art and media is about maturing, learning life lessons, going on adventures of discovery, and why one of the most loved narrative tropes is the ‘rags to riches’ story (e.g. Harry Potter, Cinderella, Slumdog Millionaire, Bridget Jones’s Diary and the lives ofOprah Winfrey, Susan Boyle and Richard Branson) – in essence, growing up.

The success story of Richard Branson is well-known and a classic rags-to-riches narrative.

What does growing look like?

Bridget Jones’s goals were to get a boyfriend (hopefully the right one), a better job and a bit of (self-) respect. Once she understood how these aspirational goals defined her, she set out doing her best to achieve them. By the end of the film she had accomplished her goals and had grown as a person.

The efforts Bridget made during 97 minutes of screen time propelled her to grow and enhance her ‘Self’; but her external achievements would not have been possible without internal growth and her mind being in the right place. Growth, then, is as much about accumulating and ticking off boxes as it is about learning and gaining understanding.

How do we grow?

Name three life goals off the top of your head. You can probably name three goals for this year alone too, this week or even this day. The fact that these are prominent in your mind means (or should mean) that the decisions you are making and actions you are taking are moving you towards achieving or manifesting those goals.

But what products, services and people are available to you to help you achieve those goals and, therefore, grow as a person? Are you a cyclist? Chances are you read up on cycling news, products, courses, races. If you want to buy your first investment property, you will be reading the property news, be a part of the real estate groups on Facebook, subscribed to newsletters. If your goal is as broad – but important – as simply wanting to be happy, you will understand what makes you happy and be striving to achieve those things.

What does it mean for digital communications and social media?

Growth and self-actualisation are the aspirational factors that motivate individuals to participate in any activity, acquisition or consumption. With disposable income and social mobility, people are free to decide how they define themselves and what their goals are.

In digital communications and social media – and in the age of the individual – attempts to manipulate those goals or aspirations are wasteful and often insulting.

With the enormous reach and market potential offered by digital channels, the clever strategy is to increase your visibility and announce your presence to those with goals that are aligned with your product or service offering. This serves the dual role of empowering consumers and saving your business money. Compare the waste of using a big net for a certain type of fish, rather than many fishing rods with the lure that suits your chosen fish.

The material wealth of Harry was always a distant second to the wealth he accumulated in respect, experience, family and friends.

The key, then, is to identify what your audience hungers for. What is their lure? What is it that makes them tick? What are the life goals that helps them to grow? On digital channels, you can discover this simply by researching what pages your audience likes, what they comment on, what groups they are a part of, what images they share (essentially their metadata) – in effect, you need to watch, listen and do your homework.

Those with the opportunity to pursue growth will be making decisions daily that move them towards attaining their daily/weekly/yearly life goals. If you can identify those goals then you can identify what your product or service is going to offer, what your marketing message is going to be and, therefore, how you are going to help your customer, client or audience to grow.

The internal and external growth of Jamal parallel each other throughout Slumdog Millionaire.

That brings to a close our series on the five social motives. Understanding of these motives is an important part of understanding who we are as individuals and communities and it is vital to success in a socially-connected world. Thanks for reading. Be sure to check into Social Motive for regular discussion on communications and marketing in the digital sphere.

In Social Motive’s series on the five core social motives, we explore just what it is that drives us to feel, think and act.

According to social psychologist Dr Susan Fiske, the basis behind our decisions in social situations can be distilled into five core motives: trust, understanding, growing, influencing, and belonging.

Understanding these five core social motives is essential to any situation where we interact with other people; in essence, the five core social motives make up the very fabric of our lives.

To trust

Trust is one of the most important elements of any human relationship. It is one of the first and most valuable things we learn as infants, and it continues its importance deep into our adult lives.

What makes trust so important?

The social motivation to trust is essential to decision-making and action-taking. We need to trust that we can make our decisions and take action free from punishment, shame and alienation.

Trust, then, is the freedom to act. The two-way transfer of trust in a relationship makes it strong, just as trust does between members of larger groups. Trust relies on the principle of reciprocity – both reward for those who repay it and punishment for those who break it.

What does trust look like?

When you walk out your front door in Australia, you trust that you will not be arrested or impeded by the authorities provided that you don’t harm others and act within the bounds of the law. In return, the government (ideally) provides you with a safe and supportive society in which to pursue your own route to happiness.

On the balance sheet, this results in a richly diverse and strong society because of the constant and unimpeded transfer of value – cultural, physical and intellectual – between all stakeholders.

To illustrate the effects of the opposite, compare Australia to North Korea, where the absence of trust between government and citizens has had dire consequences. A distrust of government might even partly explain the stunning popularity of a certain orange-coiffed presidential candidate.

On an interpersonal level, trust allows you to express yourself and be who you are. In trusting relationships, you can act more freely with the knowledge that your partner has got your back.

This transfer of value is (at least ostensibly) selfless and requires both parties to give up or risk something in order to gain something.

What does it mean in the digital sphere and for content marketing?

Trust is gained and grown by offering up something for nothing. You must make an investment of time and value and bear a bit of risk without asking for reward.

Conversely, trust can be diminished and eroded by being pushy, sleazy and overly salesy. This has never been more true than in our day and age where there are myriad avenues with which businesses can reach consumers and each other.

If content creation forms a part of your strategy for reaching out to customers, clients and patrons, your content must either surprise, inform or entertain – and ideally all three. If it is failing to do this, or if it continually asks for a value exchange, trust will decay, the brand’s standing will diminish and the business will appear detached from reality – corporate, impersonal and uncaring.

Worse, if it takes the form of clickbait (which, happily, is on the decline) the true nature of your content and content strategy will be exposed for what it is: desperate. And as readership/engagement drops off, so begins a vicious cycle.

‘I know what you mean, Blair. Trust’s a tough thing to come by these days. Tell you what: why don’t you just trust in the Lord?’

It follows that sustainable marketing strategies and business practices rely on the steady growth and maintenance of relationships between business and client. You must work to ensure your content and communications aren’t based around shallow vanity metrics such as simple clicks and likes.

By providing a small investment of time and risk – and quality content – you will be rewarded with loyalty and trust. This is why trust – society’s mortar and key to successful personal, social and business relationships – is one of the five core social motives.

And as the saying/Hallmark card/Instagram inspo-quote goes: trust takes years to build, seconds to break, and forever to repair. Ensure you respect it. Because if you don’t trust anyone and no one trusts you?

If you’re an Instagram user, over the past few days you will have seen the countless posts asking you to ‘turn me on’. We say, don’t do it!On March 15, 2016 Instagram announced that they’re making changes to their algorithm. These changes will prioritise the content you’re more likely to enjoy, instead of images posted in chronological order as it has been in the past.

Individuals and businesses have gone crazy over the past few days, posting images encouraging their followers to turn on their notifications. If you have taken their advice, you’re probably going to regret it.

While we all love Katy Perry, she posts photos on Instagram multiple times a day. Turning on notifications would be like receiving a text message from her every single time she posts. Now imagine that happening with multiple people you follow. Our lives are noisy enough; we don’t need this.

People have been up in arms about similar changes made to Facebook years ago and now they are tarring the changes to Instagram with the same brush – but it is so different. Why? The changes to Facebook were made to business pages. This ensured that users’ newsfeeds were not overtaken by marketing messages, which, when you think about it, we should all be grateful for. The difference with Instagram is that business pages don’t exist. You either have an Instagram account or you don’t; therefore we’re all on a level playing field and this is literally about giving you quality content.

Changing the Instagram feed from chronological order to related content will only help people and businesses who have superior content marketing strategies. If you’re giving your audience what they want, then your content will be prioritised in their newsfeed, and if they come online five hours after you have posted, they will see it. How good is that?

These changes will sort the strategists from the pretenders and will make our Instagram feeds more relevant. Spend less time worrying that your audience will no longer see your content and spend more time focusing on how to deliver them what they want to see, and you can’t lose.

Don’t turn on our notifications, because while you think these changes are annoying, it won’t be as annoying as your phone beeping every single time we post.

Let’s be honest: we all know what Instagram is and how it helps us common folk share our photos with the world. Not to mention how it allows us to look that little bit more attractive with its flattering filters.We follow our friends on Instagram to keep up with their lives and we follow celebrities so we can admire their lavish lifestyles.

When Facebook acquired Instagram in April 2012 for US$1 billion, the platform had 30 million users. Today, over 400 million people actively use Instagram on a monthly basis.

And with over 400 million users, chances are your target market is on Instagram.

Instagram statistics – January 2016

Major brands in Australia are seeing the benefits of Instagram for business and they are cashing in, and some are doing it very well.

A study recently commissioned by Japanese app Takumi found that Instagram delivers more sales and consumer actions than any other social platform.68 per cent of people 18-24 years old claimed that they are more inclined to purchase something after someone they followed on Instagram shared it. But why is that?

Instagram is a beautiful, sophisticated and aspirational community and through images it provides businesses the opportunity to develop a trusting relationship with their customers.

Content

Content is easy because the best content is user generated content (UGC). This is how communities are built. Instagram provides you with the opportunity to search for the content your customers are posting, engage with them via that content and then share their beautiful photos via your business profile.

The feeling of appreciation that this sharing facilitates goes both ways, with followers developing a sense of participation in your profile and the content you’re delivering. This is what builds customer relationships and engenders brand loyalty to your business.The type of content you want to be sharing are your products being used in everyday life. Consumers can relate to these images; not the product sitting on a shelf in your store, or catalogue images your suppliers have sent. The aspirational element of Instagram drives this. Give your audience content to aspire to.

But what if you have killer content and no followers, how do you get your content seen? Hashtags!

Hashtags are the conduit in the Instagram community. They are the easiest way to allow users to search for images they’re interested in and they are also the best way for you to get your content seen by your audience. Use hashtags that are specific to your brand, but also use ones that are generic to the products you’re selling. This is the most effective way for you to reach a community of followers already interested in what your business offers.

Finding the right balance with your hashtags is important. While you need to ensure you are not overloading your posts with irrelevant tags for the sake of more unrelated engagement, you also need to use enough tags to ensure your content is seen by the correct audience. Failure to use hashtags at all basically renders your content as private. Be sure to find the right balance for your business.

Analytics

Like most marketing efforts, the end goal of your Instagram posts is to generate more leads or sales, and the best way to do that is to drive the traffic through to your website. This part, though, may not be as easy as it seems. Instagram have designed their platform to keep you there. You cannot use links in the description of the photos you upload to Instagram. Rather, you can only use one URL in the bio of your account. The limitations on links renders your bio prime real estate. Treat it that way and make sure you’re using it.

As with any digital marketing, we want to see the fruits of our labour and determine how much traffic we’re generating from Instagram to our website. Again, no easy feat. Instagram is designed to keep you there. Instagram users will not appear on your Google analytics as traffic generated through Instagram. Instead, these visitors are categorised as direct traffic. To overcome this, be sure to use a Google URL in your bio; you can even run it through Bitly to make it look a little prettier.

The future looks bright for Instagram, with over 55 per cent of internet users between 18 and 29 years old using the platform regularly. This is only set to increase in the immediate future with marketers forecast to spend over $1.48 billion in advertising across the platform in 2016 and $2.81 billion in 2017, so as this market matures rapidly, don’t get left behind!